Hernando County has a reputation and not one any county should be proud of. "LIVE RELEASE" is definitely not their forte. After a lot of negative attention due to their lack of compasison and extremely high killing, their solution is to change the laws which guarantees even more killing.

Within the proposed ordinance is a provision that classifies just about every dog as a "hybrid," which allows the county to refuse to put the animal up for adoption. Hybrid is defined as the result of the "mating of two distinctly homozygous animals and is synonymous with “heterozygous.” While the county has declared homozygous and heterozygous as ’synonymous’ they are in fact opposites. What it means is that the county reserves the right to refuse to adopt any breed of dog and simply kill it instead.

If that wasn't bad enough, it also states:

"It shall be unlawful for any person to harbor, feed and/or keep any stray animal unless he or she has notified animal services within 24 hours from the time such animal came into his or her possession. Upon receiving such notice, an animal control officer may take such animal and place it in the animal shelter. It shall be unlawful for any person to refuse to surrender any such stray animal to an animal control officer upon such officer’s demand."

Daily, Hernando County ACO's are picking up strays and won't allow compassionate citizens/taxpayers to help these animals by feeding & altering. They don't want them on the streets and aren't very understanding when animal lovers in Hernando County get cited for having compassion and helping them. It seems the county would rather kill.

Due to multiple employee mistakes that caused animals their life, Deputies are now in charge of field operations and enforcement for Animal Services. Also, Animal Service officers are now part of the sheriff's patrol division.

The following are from actual reports that occurred at Hernando County Animal Services:

" Workers did not consistently verify that an animal was dead before removing the animal for storage and disposal.Workers did not consistently test to ensure that animals were property anesthetized before the euthanasia drug was injected into the heart.

In one case, the report stated, "one cat was stuck three times in the chest before the heart was located. This cat was never assessed for anesthesia level or pain prior to inserting the needle into the cat's chest.''"

Killing was performed in plain view of conscious animals.

Holds placed on dogs and cats but are killed, animals sitting in kennels injured, hurt, sick, with no veterinary care or pain medicine, and the list goes on.

We have recently requested income/outcome and will be posting that soon, we also requested in writing from them to provide us their written policies and asked them for the reasons why they do not allow cats to roam freely and why they do not support TNR. Furthermore, heartsticking IS illegal and can only be done when the animal is unconscious and that is clearly not what is happening here.

We are asking all of you to please write emails to the following and be the voice for the dogs & cats in Hernando County, Florida.

COMPASSIONATE EMPLOYEES INCREASE & ACCOUNTABILITY FOR LIVE RELEASE WORK WITH RESCUES WHO ARE WORKING 24/7 TO GET THE ANIMALS OUT EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES AND ASSISTANCE RATHER THAN CONFISCATE AND KILL TRAP, NEUTER, RELEASE (TNR) FOR STRAY/FERAL CATS RATHER THAN KILLING ON THE SPOT THE DESIRE TO HELP THE ANIMALS, RATHER THAN CONTINUE TO WORK AGAINST THEM STOP HEARTSTICKING, ILLEGAL IN THE STATE OF FLORIDA

Hernando County has a reputation and not one any county should be proud of. "LIVE RELEASE" is definitely not their forteit. After a lot of negative attention due to their lack of compasison and extremely high killing, their solution is to change the laws which guarantees even more killing.

Within the proposed ordinance is a provision that classifies just about every dog as a "hybrid," which allows the county to refuse to put the animal up for adoption. Hybrid is defined as the result of the "mating of two distinctly homozygous animals and is synonymous with “heterozygous.” While the county has declared homozygous and heterozygous as ’synonymous’ they are in fact opposites. What it means is that the county reserves the right to refuse to adopt any breed of dog and simply kill it instead.

If that wasn't bad enough, it also states:

"It shall be unlawful for any person to harbor, feed and/or keep any stray animal unless he or she has notified animal services within 24 hours from the time such animal came into his or her possession. Upon receiving such notice, an animal control officer may take such animal and place it in the animal shelter. It shall be unlawful for any person to refuse to surrender any such stray animal to an animal control officer upon such officer’s demand."

Daily, Hernando County ACO's are picking up strays and won't allow compassionate citizens/taxpayers to help these animals by feeding & altering. They don't want them on the streets and aren't very understanding when animal lovers in Hernando County get cited for having compassion and helping them. It seems the county would rather kill.

Due to multiple employee mistakes that caused animals their life, Deputies are now in charge of field operations and enforcement for Animal Services. Also, Animal Service officers are now part of the sheriff's patrol division.

The following are from actual reports that occurred at Hernando County Animal Services:

" Workers did not consistently verify that an animal was dead before removing the animal for storage and disposal.Workers did not consistently test to ensure that animals were property anesthetized before the euthanasia drug was injected into the heart.

In one case, the report stated, "one cat was stuck three times in the chest before the heart was located. This cat was never assessed for anesthesia level or pain prior to inserting the needle into the cat's chest.''"

Killing was performed in plain view of conscious animals.

Holds placed on dogs and cats but are killed, animals sitting in kennels injured, hurt, sick, with no veterinary care or pain medicine, and the list goes on.

We have recently requested income/outcome and will be posting that soon, we also requested in writing from them to provide us their written policies and asked them for the reasons why they do not allow cats to roam freely and why they do not support TNR. Furthermore, heartsticking IS illegal and can only be done when the animal is unconscious and that is clearly not what is happening here.

We are asking all of you to please write emails to the following and be the voice for the dogs & cats in Hernando County, Florida.

COMPASSIONATE EMPLOYEESINCREASE & ACCOUNTABILITY FOR LIVE RELEASEWORK WITH RESCUES WHO ARE WORKING 24/7 TO GET THE ANIMALS OUTEDUCATIONAL RESOURCES AND ASSISTANCE RATHER THAN CONFISCATE AND KILLTRAP, NEUTER, RELEASE (TNR) FOR STRAY/FERAL CATS RATHER THAN KILLING ON THE SPOTTHE DESIRE TO HELP THE ANIMALS, RATHER THAN CONTINUE TO WORK AGAINST THEMSTOP HEARTSTICKING, ILLEGAL IN THE STATE OF FLORIDA